sideways

A nice movie about wine. I already saw it once but only learned to appreciate it at the end of the movie. The guy is so extremely sad, but that makes the movie really good. He is just too true, too real, and therefore nice to see you are not as bad as he is.
And then the whole winetasting. He really appreciates it, but is more an excuse not to feel miserable. He gets in a flow when talking about wine, but he also stil gets drunk of too much of it.

de postillion

De first activity with jong TNO was in this cafe in Utrecht. I went there together with Fleur, ebcause we also had to be in Utrecht the next day. it was nice to meet the new people. I joined games of macchiavelli, twister and weerwolf. I wonder if we see them more often.

de charlatan

By accident we ended up in the charlatan. Welln ot realy by accident, but it was quite a coincidence it was the same bar I wetn to a few years ago during the gentse feesten. It was quite a surprise when I entered the bar, because I didn't expect to find it back after all the years. We danced a bit, but unfortunately it wasn't really my music.

de 8 zaligheden

I think Gent is also the city of numbers. The restaurant we went to on the second night was also with a number. We had the traditional dish gentse waterzooi, which was quite special. Good food and free drinks for us. For coffee they took us to some fancy bar.

de 4 tafels

Nice restaurant in Gent. I went there with the consortium meeting of one of my projects for my job and we had dinner with 12 people over here. My parents visited Gent just a few weeks before that and recommended the place. They have all kinds of meals form over the world and that makes the menu very varied.

wandering in Amsterdam

Gro was in Amsterdam for the weekend and that was a good occasion to take the train to Amsterdam and meet her. We had a coffee across the dom plaza, which was tow times as expensive as a regular coffee bar in Groningen (but we had a good view, so we didn't mind). We walked through the kalverstraat, not looking for something particalur and we chat.
We ran into a demonstration against fur. They walked through the klaverstraat with a lot of police protection. Strange to experience, so much violence coming form the people.

Orkater - Bloedband

Together with Joost I went to my old employee; theater de VEste. The premiere of this play was just great and guaranteed the presence of some semi-famous dutch people. It took a while before it got to me, but I really liked the dynamic and modern way of acting and making theatre. A mix of music and acting and nice choreography. three storylines intertwining, giving the characters a bit more depth, showed the other side. Nice to be in the theatre and see some people on stage.

Hemmingways

After too much bottles of wine, Fleur and I went to the hemmingways to dance some salsa. Unfortunately our colleague maarten couldn't come along, he is the salsa dancer and we just try to follow. It appears I am not a very good leader, didn't know anything. We had a good laugh and I ran into Roos accidentally. Such a coincidence.

Sauna in Peize

As a very impulsive plan I asked Fleur to got to he sauna the day after the TNO party. And we went in her car (I was happy she has one). A very relaxing day. two times loyli, a hot and cold one. The cold one with mint christals and the hot with several buckets of water.

Frysk Film Festival

Together with my dear friend Tjitske we drove in her car to Leeuwarden on an early friday night. Her friend Nynke Laverman was having the premiere of the documentary of her last show the Maisfrou in het harmoniegebouw in Leeuwarden. With a take-away salad from the Albert Heijn we had dinner just in time and arrived right on time for the show.
Nice documentary and she just makes good music. Funny to meet someone only on birthdays and then see her as an artist. As a surprise she received a golden plate for her first album siellesalt; the frysk fado.

nacht van de fascinatie

For the first time in 75 years TNO (where I work) celebrated his birthday with all the employees of TNO. Meaning 6000 people at one party in the jaarbeurs in Utrecht. Although it was called the night of fascination, it had more to do with an early evening of fascination but despite this sarcastic detail, it was a good organized party with a good atmosphere.
To extend the party into the afternoon, I prepared together with Fleur and some nice lunch. We had to go by bus to Utrecht, so it took us a while to get there and we also had to go back.
We met some new people from TNO Defence and safety and some of them drove back to Groningen with us. Fleur and I spent most time in the salsa and merengue place. We followed two workshops and it was funny to dance with colleagues you normally only see at the office. But it was really good and it really feels like more, I want to dance more, salsa and anything really. Dancing with one of the managers I normally don't know anything to say to, with a colleague who is sometimes hard to communicate with and now were getting along on the dancefloor. Music is magic.
And by the way, we had a performance of Jeroen van der Boom (jij bent zo...) and edsilia Rombley (but I missed that mostly). The night opened with a band of TNO people; and it was really good and professional. I was impressed. And singing for so many peple in such a professional entourage can only be an adrenaline kick.

cd release Vence

Finally the new CD is there. And I had the opportunity to buy that CD and the other two form before. I invited quite some people to come along to the performance in the platform theatre. But only Maarten came with me and my dad was there as well. It was a good performance, especially the second half, with a new swinging song as the last song.

4 mijl

Since a few years there is the 4 mijl (4 mile) form Haren to Groningen. For many people the reason the start jogging. I walked through the noorderplantsoen a week before and many people htat normally don't run were trying their best with red faces and wobbling tits. But I didn't, I hate running.
I went as a spectator to the finish of the 4 mijl on the vismarkt. Quite some people from the squash association were running and I was there to support them and take pictures with my new camera. THere was a very good atmosphere in the city. Many many people run along, some in weird outfits, some with many luggage and some as fast as they could. It is an event frm the people; anyone can do it, runnig 4 miles is just about 6 kilometres and will take about 30 minutes. But I was happy just to watch.

coffee united

This lovely little cafe bar in de herestraat serves very good coffee. It is a bit like starbucks, only it is not. You can also get good takeaways, as I did a few weeks before in the weekend when there was the 4mijl.

the Dreamgirls

After a stroll in the city and looking for some emotional products to buy, we decided to rent a movie to see in the afternoon. We made a lot of nice food (my first time artishok, some sushi and tortillas with guacomole) and settled ourselves in front of the laptop. Many songs and music in this movie, it has not a lot of depth and the storyline was hard to follow and didn't really get to me. It won quite some golden globes and an oscar, but is was not that good I think. The food was :-)

het feithuis

I heard a lot about it and now finally came the time to experience it myself. I happened to pass it by somewhere earlier that week and knew how to find it. It feels a bit like dudok in Rotterdam, with a bit more borwn influences. Nice capuchino and many different herbal teas. We didn't eat something, but it looked nice.

de zevende hemel

Before we went to the movies I took my sister out for dinner as a gift for her birthday. We went to this restaurant because it also has biological and vegetarian food and as my sister tries to be a vegetarian, this was a good choice. It had something classy, but also something casual. Your coat had a special place, nice plates and luxury portions, but on the other hand decorations form all kinds of influences and styles. Hence, a good restaurant with fine food and nice atmosphere. Make reservations (as I did) because it's popular.

Alles is Liefde

A wonderful Dutch movie which resembles the english version Love Actually. WIth a cast that is similar to the amount of people in the ocean's series. A true feel good movie that has something recognizable for many people. Together with my sister we went there and enjoyed it very much. It didn't even feel like we were sitting there with hundreds of people, just the two of us. Many laughs in the whole room.

Admiral Freebee

WOW! This was a very good concert. It went from melancholy to madness to overjoy and pleasure. The music was just fine although I had only listened to it the entire afternoon. Live it is much better!

Vietnam by Mister Pham

Original title something with catfish...
Read the book because I am going to Vietnam in February!! Looking forward to that. This book is about An, who is a viet-kieu; a person who emigrated to the USA after the Vietnam war. He describes a return to his native country and the bike trip he is making there. This is just a nice book, nothing special, and if you like to know something about Vietnam it is illustrative but not that much.